"iWorkPMS helps eliminate excessive idling time of workstations and increase productivity in the production line… With understanding the current production in real time, we can minimize production fluctuations and operational downtime."

— Ernest Ng

Director

Cactus Garment Co., Ltd.

Cactus is one of the leading garment manufacturers specializes in providing high end ladies woven fashion and style clothing. They also offer garment wash services to fit the needs of the high-end apparel industry.

Less visibility in production floor

Cactus is cost and quality competitive. They are able to handle large batches of orders and a small variety of designs at short delivery lead-time. With the increasing number of orders, it was difficult for them to have high visibility between production floor and head office. “Our biggest challenge was inadequate resource utilization. We found that few workers were waiting for work because of lack of materials. Idle time and bottleneck always occurred,” said Ernest.

Payroll calculation was their second challenge. Their factory workers used “paper tickets” for calculating wages. Workers would cut out a section of the “paper ticket” when they had finished processing. The line supervisors would then collect the “paper tickets” from time to time and workers would get paid accordingly. Since job progress captured manually, it increased the effort for huge data entry and compile payroll from tickets. Also, they could not measure worker performance and departmental output due to inaccurate and outdated information.

The company considered deploying iWorkPMS for production floor management in 2010.

Achieve line-balancing and monitor the production progress in real time

To effective use of manpower and resource capacity, maintaining smooth work flow in the line was very important. “iWorkPMS helps eliminate excessive idling time of workstations and increase productivity in the production line. By tracking worker productivity, material usage and work-in-progress, we can identify the bottleneck areas to optimize our resource allocation and production line setup. With understanding the current production in real time, we can minimize production fluctuations and operational downtime.”

Trace source of defects

Cactus has defined a set of Acceptance Quality Level (AQL) to ensure the quality. All garments had to meet the AQL. To minimize the defect rate, Cactus categorized all defects into different types and recorded in iWorkPMS. “The solution has provided a clear overview to seek out root cause of the defect. QC inspector can trace defective products and ensure that defects are promptly fixed. Thus, it helps reduce rework and enhance worker efficiency.”

Accurate and efficient payroll calculation

Every workstation was equipped with a RFID reader. When workers started to work, workers should scan the bundle pieces RFID Card instead of paper tickets. The readers recorded the total working time and synchronized the data to the payroll module (Extended Module of iWorkPMS).

“Without the RFID reader, it took 1 day for them to calculate the wages. Now, our accounting staff would be able to calculate their wages instantly and evaluate their performance accurately. It also prevents deception in payroll calculation since their work will be recorded in the system.”

Seamless integrated with iGarment Job Order System (JOS)

Cactus has deployed iGarmentJOS since 2001. Taking advantages of seamless integration between iGarmentJOS and iWorkPMS to attain a real-time end-to-end solution, Cactus can manage their information exchange across the organization using one platform for data access, management and collection. “We can focus less on IT infrastructure and more on building their business and providing customers with the highest-quality products.”

About Cactus

Established in 1976, Cactus Garment Co., Ltd. (Cactus) is a leading exporter of high fashion with clienteles of famous brands, designer brands, department stores and fashion chain-stores worldwide. To match with the needs of business development and increasing number of orders, Cactus has set up his own production site at Punyu, with area over 6000 sq meter, housing 14 production lines. Cactus currently has employed over 600 staff, annual production output around 500K pcs.